


The Holy or the Broken

by thattrainssailed



Category: Shadowhunters (TV)
Genre: Implied/Referenced Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Implied/Referenced Drug Use, M/M, Recovery, Religion, because it wouldn't be something I wrote if there wasn't some weird religious angle
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-20
Updated: 2019-08-20
Packaged: 2020-09-18 19:41:34
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,132
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20318449
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thattrainssailed/pseuds/thattrainssailed
Summary: He supposes it is within his birthright. Demonic genes aren’t exactly widely studied, and so the effects of them are left to guesswork and rumour. Perhaps it’s such generational memory - an event so grand and altering that it melded with the satanic forefather and was passed down through hellish bloodlines. The sentencing of humans. The making of mundanes. The moment of the Fall.Temptation is written upon Magnus’ atoms.





	The Holy or the Broken

When Magnus closes his eyes, he can remember Eden.

It should be impossible. For all his claims of age and history, he was not quite in existence for the Fall. In fact, he had missed it by roughly 201,600 years - give or take a decade or two. And yet if he concentrates, sets his mind to darkness, that place beyond history, the images come to him. Warm sun on plush grass. Chattering birds in every direction. Thick branches watching over everything, shining fruit cradled amongst their leaves. A serpentine crawl, tongue flicking out to taste approaching chaos on the air.

Sweet juice against an innocent tongue. The plucking of leaves. Silence in rage.

He supposes it is within his birthright. Demonic genes aren’t exactly widely studied, and so the effects of them are left to guesswork and rumour. Perhaps it’s such generational memory - an event so grand and altering that it melded with the satanic forefather and was passed down through hellish bloodlines. The sentencing of humans. The making of mundanes. The moment of the Fall.

Temptation is written upon Magnus’ atoms.

It is hardly something from which he shies away. On the contrary, from the moment he gains the strength to summon his magic and banish his father back to Edom (and isn’t that some sick joke, to name paradise and inferno so similarly), there is desire. The exertion stings from inside his ribs, bile rising from his throat with the guilt of destroying another parent. Memories blink across his fogging vision. Silver metal. Sickening liquid. His mother, unmoving, eyes open. It floods him. He reaches. He does not know what he needs. It comes to him regardless. The sourness of alcohol replaces that of bile, and the sharp taste brings Magnus to himself.

Years pass, and Magnus finds that temptation is not restricted to grief.

While it is a myth that all warlocks are decadent, it is certainly true enough that their kind are more attracted to the… more gratifying areas of life. A life expectancy of eternity leaves plenty of room for experimentation, and Magnus happily takes the opportunity in stride. He selects his pleasures carefully at first. Slowly courts his lovers. Sips drinks until he finds the one his palette craves. Discreetly sources his vices, liaising with only the most reputed sellers, and only once or twice a decade.

He intends to hold control. Pepper his life with indulgence. He is but a century old at this point; barely a twinkle in the eyes of some of the warlocks with whom he dines. He has plenty of time to taste the delights of this life. An eternity is the perfect span in which to edge desires.

And then he meets Camille.

The first time they speak, she leans in close and whispers of desire.

Magnus smells the fruit, sweet and ripe.

Temptation is a longer fall than he could have ever imagined.

It’s dark in here. Magnus flounders, grasping for direction. He follows a trail of dim lights wherever they may lead him; quick flashes of sex; glass after glass of liquor; the bitter cure of opium filling every crevice of his body. He spends a century like that, twisting around blackness. The void of desire yawns wider with every vice he swallows. It’s a century and a half later that the hollow grows even greater than his body, more enormous than he could ever fill. The darkness vanishes. Magnus halts. Stasis holds him.

When he looks again, Camille is gone.

It takes a long time before Magnus can move. An age before he can begin to shuffle from the paralysis of his implosion of desire. Ragnor and Catarina stand patiently beside him, hands hovering, ready to reach out should he fall again. He makes his resolution against descent. He ignores the scent of fruit when it passes his senses.

It is an exercise in restraint. 

Slowly, he builds. Goes clean and sober, only indulging in the occasional brief fling. The move to New York helps, and a snap election lands him, somewhat disoriented, in the role of High Warlock. Despite the whiplash, he does his best, and his reputation swell. In private, he finds harmony with his magic again.

Pandemonium is, to everyone’s surprise, Catarina’s idea. She’s always been an advocate for balance, after all (and perhaps there is a wistfulness for control, for something other than the lax chaos that almost took her dearest friend). It becomes a haven of sorts - a place for downworlders to exist in safety, find temptation within a closed room and leave it there once they are done. At first, Magnus fears that the throb of music and smell of whiskey will be too much, that the club will be nothing but an asylum for relapse. Yet his discipline is greater than he could have imagined. Somewhere in the passing decades, he found a medium. Three drinks per night. Dancing with only the occasional hookup. A broad distance from other substances. Magnus’ kingdom sees him ruling himself just as carefully. For a long time, the vision of Eden remains but ancestry.

Then the news comes. Valentine. The echoes of a war long since mourned.

Two weeks later, four nephilim enter the club.

The moment Magnus sees Alexander Lightwood, his mind rises to Eden.

Temptation curls around him, its maw primed to strike.

It is a test, he tells himself. A last attempt by the serpent. And God knows he’s far smarter than Adam and Eve ever were.

The mantra lasts until he sees Alexander smile.

All things considered, it should be ruinous. He has not felt a pull like this in over a century; not since he last reached for a pipe. Yet there is something of a… comfort to the urge. Something beyond simple familiarity. He imagines the shadowhunter under him, around him, and while the desire trembles, there is something in the core of it that remains steady. It isn’t until after weeks of flirting and blushing and cautious conversations that Magnus realises what it is.

Magnus  _ yearns. _

Beyond temptation. Beyond vice. Beyond suggestions whispered into his ear by some long-dead serpent. Past it all, there is this impossible nephilim.

Magnus yearns, and he realises that this memory of Eden does not come from his demonic side at all. The fruit shines before him, and it is so essentially human to reach out for it.

Alexander’s lips are the first bite of sweet harvest.

As he holds the man, learns to move with him, grows to fit his body perfectly against the other, he thinks of temptation. Of poisoned fruit and perfect sustenance. They live, and Magnus understands desire far better than he ever has before.

Alexander kisses him, and Magnus shivers at the raw humanity of hunger.

**Author's Note:**

> I would describe this as "what the everloving fuck am I talking about?"
> 
> Apologies for the radio silence from me - I've started my thesis year and I'm already halfway dead.
> 
> For inevitably more garbage, follow on me [tumblr](https://thattrainssailed.tumblr.com/).


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